Whole
by psquare
Summary: [Oneshot] George Weasley finds a reason to fight and realises that they would be together, always. At the end, and beyond, because that is how they are meant to be: whole. [Major SPOILERS for Book 7. You are warned.]


**_A/N_**: I've told you once, I'll tell it again: This story contains SPOILERS for the ending of Book 7, so if you haven't read it yet, don't read this, because that ending is a truly beautiful one, meant to be enjoyed to the hilt by the unsuspecting mind. 

I also don't own Harry Potter, or any of its characters.

Nothing else to say, except, poor George…

* * *

**_Whole _**

He couldn't breathe.

Pandemonium raged around him, people screaming, crying out in pain, fighting, talking, sobbing, _sobbing_… his mother was there, sobbing, but that seemed so distant again, like he was in a different world, in some ethereal form, watching all that was happening in the Great Hall from a place high, high above, like he was in History of Magic class, eyes glazed, mind unfocussed.

Then, like an ink pellet to the head on the verge of slumber, a hand gripped his shoulder.

George Weasley looked over his shoulder to see Bill's scarred face, his brown eyes glistening. He did not say anything; George assumed this was people meant by 'silent reassurance'.

He still couldn't breathe.

He looked down at Fred's face again, as he watched him, that quirk of the lips still frozen on his face, the world faded out once more. _His _world – a world occupied by disbelief, overwhelming grief that seemed to be caught against a dam, unsure of when or how to come out, distant, confused, feverish memories of all the moments he'd spent together with his twin – seemed to expand within him – though that could be his lungs waiting to burst; he couldn't breathe…

Couldn't _breathe_…

"_Mate, breathe. I've faced goblins practically breathing into my face before; I think I can tolerate yours_."

That was what he _would_ say… wasn't it?

George suddenly wasn't sure.

In a great, rasping breath, he sucked in some air, and though the constriction in his chest eased somewhat, there was still a terrible, terrible weight inside of him, resting on his diaphragm, trying to pull him under…

Pull him under what?

Grief?

George supposed that he should be bending over his brother, crying like his mother was, saying broken words of grief and disillusionment, disbelief and bereavement, but he just couldn't… just couldn't bring himself to do something like that. Not when Fred kept popping up in his mind, saying things like, "_Don't be such a __**sap**__, George!_"

Or that was what George _thought_ he would say. Fred wasn't around to say them, after all.

Fred was dead.

That was a truth.

It was also a truth that happened to rhyme.

And that was definitely a joke Fred would've scoffed at.

"Sorry, mate," George found himself whispering, "Couldn't come up with anything better."

He finally took his eyes off his twin's face to see his father looking at him now, eyes red, Charlie and Ginny next to him; Fleur, her beauty amplified a millionfold by the grief written into her face, and Ron and Hermione, bloodied, dirty and grieved. He thought he could see Harry, staggering away into the school, shock and sadness in his eyes.

And, of course: the pity.

He had been wondering when they'd get to that part.

Maybe he had to say something now. Maybe something heroic like "I don't want pity," or "Half of myself has been torn away from me now" or something incredibly angsty like "At least now you need not have to get confused between us, Mum." But wait. He had already used that when Snape had shorn off his ear – something that had happened what seemed like a lifetime ago.

But the truth was, he didn't want to say any of those things, because he didn't really mean them.

He _wanted_ sympathy. Now more than ever. The world was so incredibly confusing, and so incredibly full and empty, that he wanted nothing more than a pair of warm, inviting arms to fall into, a welcome lap to lay his head on, to sleep away the burgeoning despair…

Fred's death – yes, there, he'd thought it at last, saying Voldemort's name was nothing compared to it – had opened something in him, a hole that ached, and ached, and ached. He was Fred and George, and George and Fred, and everything about them. To be referred to as just George seemed an incredibly frightening prospect to him. He wouldn't go so far as to say that half his soul had been ripped from him – "_You've been reading too many sappy novels, mate, I knew it_" – but his identity, certainly had a gaping hole in it. He probably would get over the grief one day, but that hole would never disappear. And his soul, his whole, unmutilated soul, would occasionally be sucked into the vacuum that that hole would create, only to be pulled back by fond memories.

It might even grow smaller.

"George?"

Ginny. Of course. Youngest, least patient. Almost like, "Get on with it, George – express your grief, we'll comfort you, and get back to the war."

But the tears just wouldn't come. They were caught behind that dam, still looking for an opening…

He finally reached out to touch Fred's hand – already beginning to turn cold, or was it turning cold because he was expecting it to? – and wrapped it into a limp fist, holding it in his own. He closed his eyes, and a cascade of memories flooded his mind – Hogwarts, pranks, Dungbombs, Filch, Marauder's Map, Lee, Zonko's, Quidditch, the Wizarding Wheezes, the endless experiments, the rebellion, their spectacular departure from Hogwarts, the teasing, business, how he always seemed to be brimming with ideas, and George would work out ways to execute them; how Fred was always better with the girls – _some_how; how often he would copy George's homework; how they balanced each other.

No, a part of him hadn't been torn away.

He and Fred were different.

And that made their bond all the more special.

Oh, this was… this was… this was so _unfair_, that Fred, _Fred_ was the only one among them to be… to be _taken_, and George ought to have been there with him, ought to have shared that last joke, add a witty rejoinder, flash each other those devilishly identical grins.

Then, somehow, something broke.

George's eyes snapped open, and his hands trembled, and hot – scaldingly hot – liquid welled up in the corners of his eyes. That liquid finally spilled onto his cheek, even hotter than before, and suddenly he was bending over his brother, fingers digging into Fred's T-shirt, crying like had never cried before, since he was five and had broken his toy broomstick – and his ankle – crashing into a tree. His twin lay just as broken by his side, and there was nothing he had done about it… nothing he _could_ have done about it…

Again from that distant place he could feel a hand on his shoulder, and another on his hair, and he found himself craving and detesting that touch, and the tears were coming hotter and faster, and, by God, how he wished Fred were with him again, he could go anywhere, do anything, just with Fred by his side…

It was then that that cold voice came, resounded in the sudden, deafening silence.

Voldemort.

George listened, still not willing to lift his head from Fred's chest, where no strong heart-beat sounded, where the only sound was his own heart pounding madly against his ribs.

_Harry…_

… _is dead_?

Cries of shock and grief pierced the Hall, and the news stabbed through George like a white-hot poker. He stood up, letting Fred's limp hand fall to the floor. _Harry was dead_. With Harry dead, Dumbledore dead, they had lost their last line of defence. They were going to be slaughtered.

_Was that what Fred had died for?_

Was that all his death meant? To be nothing more than a starting blip before an era of darkness, destruction, evil…

Lee Jordan came by his side, pale, bloodied but determined. "Mate, we've got to fight," he whispered.

A thousand questions bombarded George's head in quick succession: _Fight? Against Voldemort? Without Dumbledore? Without Harry?_

_Without Fred?_

Despair clawed at his insides, it was worse than facing a Dementor, worse than his most feverish nightmares of hell, because it wasn't a physical pain he was suffering from – not from the bruises and cuts he had sustained from his fight with the Death Eaters – but from a deeper, darker infliction that refused to let him _move_, to even contemplate even the very idea of moving, as if both his body and mind were under the Body-Bind Curse.

_Help me_, he thought desperately, closing his eyes again, _help me, Fred…_

Then, suddenly, a thought, an image entered his mind, unbidden…

It was pitch dark, he was alone, the darkness around him practically seemed to be _moving_, shifting and swaying in the breeze, leaves rustling – he was in the Forest. A sudden, soft beam of light illuminated the ground, like the moonlight had decided to peep through the trees, and he could see a peculiar round stone rolling along the ground, and then it suddenly flipped, not once, but twice, then thrice…

After that, all he could see were the back of his eyelids, eyes raw from crying.

He opened his eyes, and saw Fred.

It was Fred Weasley in front of him – grinning, standing with the body weight just partially shifted onto one leg, eyes gleaming, his mirror image – but it _wasn't_ Fred, because Fred wasn't pearly white and vaguely translucent, and Fred couldn't be alive, not when his body still lay on the floor, immobile and cold…

"Fred?" he whispered, at long last.

"Wondered when you'd be getting to that," Fred said, his grin widening. "I've only been gone for a short while, and look at how slow you've _already_ gotten."

George looked around him – nobody seemed to pay heed that he was talking to Fred; Lee Jordan stood next to him, absorbed in conversation with a distraught Alicia Spinnet; the rest of his family, along with most of the others in the Hall who could still move had begun to congregate at the front doors, where it was said that Voldemort was approaching, with Harry's body…

"Are you –," George began hoarsely, "Are you a ghost?"

Fred seemed to contemplate on that for a moment, before saying, "No, I wouldn't say that. If I were a ghost, would I be able to do this?" He reached out one pearly white hand and placed it on George's shoulder; to George's surprise, he found he was able to feel the weight of the hand on his shoulder, the warmth of the flesh, as though it had been really Fred's hand. George reached up with his own hand – which was inexplicably cold and trembling – and placed it on his, revelling in the warmth. "How… how did you…?"

"I'm not entirely sure about that, either," Fred said. "But I'm pretty certain that it's got some convoluted, pretty sounding explanation that's more up Dumbledore's tree than mine. But listen," he continued, more seriously now, "pull yourself together. You know the others need you."

"N-need me? But I need _you_! I –"

"He's coming, George, and trust me, everything is not what it seems. You have to fight." Fred smiled again. "We still need to make those dreams come true, remember?"

"D-dreams?"

Fred rolled his eyes. "You're just going to have to make me say it, aren't you?"

"Say what?"

"I love you, bro." Somehow, those opalescent eyes softened with affection. "We haven't told each other that for a long time, you know? Whatever things may seem like now, I still haven't left you. I never will." The softness morphed into amusement in a flash. "God, George, you're making me sound cliché already."

"Cliché is good," George said, a shadow of a smile quirking his lips.

Fred laughed. He was starting to get paler. "I've got to leave," he said quietly. "Fight, George. They need you – _us_. Hogwarts does. Its future generations of students – our products." He grinned. "Right?"

"Absolutely, mate." At this point, George couldn't hold back anymore, and reached out to pull Fred into an embrace, his twin's aura warm and comforting. "I love you too," he whispered.

Loud, grieved squeals crying Harry's name were starting to come from the front doors.

They pulled away from each other – Fred was starting to disappear fast. "Fight, George," he said again, before he was gone, nothing more than a wisp of the supernatural, embedded forever in George's memories. He blinked, and turned to the doors – Voldemort was already there. It was now or never.

He grabbed Lee Jordan's shoulder from next to him, and said determinedly, "Come on, Lee, we're not going to be letting mouldy Voldy and his cronies overpower us."

Lee looked at him, surprised. "But Harry is…"

"Harry would've wanted us old DA members to do this." He smiled slightly. "I _know_ Fred wants us to, so let's get going."

Lee's eyes widened for a moment, before he nodded too, and both of them pulled out their wands. There were tough times ahead, George knew – death stared at them all through the great Hogwarts doors, and his grief, still threatening to overwhelm, nipped at his heels. But he could surge forward with the knowledge that no part of him had been taken away – if anything, it was only truly _now_ that he was Fred and George.

His soul was finally whole again.

The commotion at the front doors flared into rebellion, and as the doors flew open, and death glided in, George Weasley sprinted into battle.

_**Finis**_


End file.
